Forgiveness

Our purpose is to honor the God who created us, and if in no other way we invite you to join us in this most basic way.

But to honor him you must be reconciled with him. Even if you have done no great evil (which is rare enough), the best of us know that the greatest and most basic obstacle we overcome in doing good is our own selves. Those who overcome the evil that is in them know more than anyone just how much evil and inhumanity is in them. And those with any sense of justice understand that simply not succumbing to this evil does not undo it or mean that it is not there.

If we do not indulge this evil, this only means that we do not answer for it to our fellow men, great as this evil is. But we answer for it to the one who created us. He made our eyes: he has seen everything we have done. He made our hearts: he knows every evil that is there whether we act on it or resist it.

But if one is humble, and admits to the crimes of his heart whether or not he has resisted them, and resists them in the strength the Creator has given every man to resist temptation, he can then honor his Creator, and be forgiven, as God has given his written promise.

He that hideth his sins, shall not prosper: but he that confesseth, and forsaketh them, shall have mercy.

Proverbs of Solomon 28:13

God resisteth the proud, and giveth grace to the humble.

The Letter of James 4:6

For much of history few realized even partly what the mercy of God cost him. But two thousand years ago in Israel God showed what his mercy meant, what we meant to him, and what it means to us (though we so little understand it).

God became a man named Iesous (Joshua, or Jesus), and allowed himself to be killed in a torturous Roman crucifixion, and returned to life to put away the condemnation of death for anyone who ever has or ever will trust in God’s mercy.